Election

What We Learned About Michele Bachmann This Week

Posted by on August 14, 2011 at 3:43 am. NO Comments :

The winner of the Ames, Iowa Republican Straw Poll (by a mere 152 votes over Ron Paul), Michele Bachmann revealed much of herself to the electorate this week.

Michele Bachmann

First, in the Fox News debate on Thursday, Bachmann was asked about her recent confession that, despite not wanting to pursue tax law in college, she did so anyway at the behest of her husband because…

“…the Lord said, ‘Be submissive. Wives, you are to be submissive to your husbands.'”

When she was asked at the debate whether she would be submissive to her husband were she elected president, she responded by attempting to redefine the term:

“…it means respect. I respect my husband. He’s a wonderful, godly man, and a great father. And he respects me as his wife. That’s how we operate our marriage. We respect each other.”

The problem with that answer is that no dictionary, and nowhere in the Bible, is submission defined as respect. What’s more, the Bible doesn’t say that husbands should be submissive to their wives. So even if submission did mean respect, it is not reciprocal, as Bachmann implies. Ultimately, her answer to the question was that, since submission equals respect, and respect is demonstrated by capitulating to your husband’s demands, Bachmann would indeed be submissive to her husband as president.

The second thing we learned was that, until recently, Bachmann lacked faith in America. In her presentation prior to the straw poll, she told Iowans that…

“As we’ve been all over the state, what we have seen is a restoration of that dream and you have restored in me my faith in America.”

I wonder if all the right-wing, pseudo-patriots who became faint upon hearing that Michelle Obama’s national pride was restored during her husband’s campaign for president in 2008, will be equally as appalled at Bachmann’s confession? Furthermore, what will they make of her disparagement of the whole of the nation other than Iowa?

“I see on television destruction all across the country, but not in Iowa. It doesn’t matter what city I’m in, I see happy, confident, optimistic people.”

So Iowa is the island of euphoria in a nation beset by turmoil and despair. Apparently she sees depressed, reticent, pessimists from Maine to California. It would be interesting to see how she would campaign in the other 49 states if she wins the nomination, which, of course, she won’t, but that’s another story.

Mitt Romney: Corporations Are People, My Friend

Posted by on August 12, 2011 at 12:24 am. 5 Comments :

The front-runner for the Republican nomination for president, Mitt Romney, took a courageous stand today in support of the browbeaten, wealthy corporations of America:

That’s right. Corporations are people. They’re born, they live, they dream, they love. And that’s not all…

Soylent Green is people. Corporations are people. And don’t even get me started on Depeche Mode.

It’s about time somebody stood up for the downtrodden multinationals. When will society treat them fairly and allow them to marry and to serve in the armed forces? While they can’t vote, at least they can manipulate elections with their riches because the Supreme Court has ruled that money is speech. And since corporations have more money than “ordinary” people, they get more speech.

Aint Democracy grand? Way to go, Mitt.

Rasmussen Poll Asks If The Tea Party Are Terrorists

Posted by on August 8, 2011 at 6:06 pm. 5 Comments :

Tea Party Terrorists

Rassmussen Reports, the official Fox News source for conservatively biased polling, conducted an interesting survey over the weekend that asked:

“Some people have accused the Tea Party of acting like economic terrorists during the budget debates. Are members of the Tea Party economic terrorists?”

I suppose it depends on how you define “economic terrorists.” Would a party that advocates letting the nation default on their debt be considered terrorists? What about a party that asserts that an S&P downgrade would be a good thing (we’ve seen how that worked out)? What about a party that holds a nation hostage in order to force a political agenda down the throats of a populace that opposes the agenda?

Setting aside whether or not we should apply rhetoric like “terrorist” to political adversaries, the result of the poll was that nearly a third (29%) of respondents said that they do regard the Tea Party as terrorists. That’s an astonishing result. Fifty-five percent disagreed and 16% are undecided. That means that nearly half the country believe that the Tea Party are, or might be, terrorists. And remember, this is Rasmussen, the wing-nuttiest of all pollsters.

These results drive home the point I made when I wrote Why Is Anyone Listening To The #@$%*#& Tea Party? It is a discredited constituency that couldn’t fill the back room at an Applebys. Yet for some reason too many in the media and in Washington, including Democrats, take them seriously. That breakdown of mental acuity helped to sap trillions of dollars of wealth from asset markets in the past couple of weeks.

Additionally, the Rassmussen poll shows that…

“…a plurality (43%) of all voters think the Tea Party has made things worse of [sic] the country in the budget debates in Congress. Thirty-two percent (32%) say the Tea Party has made things better for America, and 14% say it’s had no impact. Eleven percent (11%) are undecided.”

Again, this is Rasmussen! If a plurality of voters in a Rasmussen poll think that the Tea Party has made things worse, the real number must be a substantial majority. Consequently, any politician who throws in with the Tea Party is representing a phantom movement and contributing to the harm that these phony radicals are causing.

More likely, they are serving their AstroTurf masters at Americans for Prosperity and other Koch-funded frauds. A good percentage of the millions of dollars that it takes to produce the mirage that is the Tea Party is surely flowing into the campaign accounts of Republicans across the nation. But given the results of this poll, and virtually every other one on the subject, these greedy pols will soon regret their decision.

Sarah Palin Is Not Running For President And Fox News Is Lying About It

Posted by on August 4, 2011 at 10:56 am. 3 Comments :

Sarah PalinThe GOP field of candidates seeking the 2012 presidential nomination is pretty settled. The only significant holdouts are the Texas evangelical, secessionist governor Rick Perry, and former half-term Alaska governor, and Fox News bobble-head, Sarah Palin.

The thing is, Palin is not running. She has no campaign staff; no organization in early primary states; no press office. Polls place her near the bottom of the pack and losing to President Obama by 20 points. She is not engaging in public appearances. In fact, her much ballyhooed national bus tour was aborted after just six days without ever making it off the east coast.

Too bad. I wish she were running. It would add another element of comic relief to supplement Newt Gingrich and Michele Bachmann. With Donald Trump out of the game the comedy factor took a serious hit.

The problem is that Fox News is still pretending that she’s a candidate and, by doing so, they are deliberately lying (so what else is new). Several months ago there were four Fox employees who were also speculative candidates for the Republican nomination: Palin, Gingrich, Santorum, and Huckabee. All four were in precisely the same position with regard to the race. They were all openly exploring campaigns and discussing it in public. At that time Fox gave two of them, Gingrich and Santorum, ultimatums insisting that they declare their intentions or be terminated. There was no apparent reason for excluding Palin and Huckabee from that edict.

Since then Gingrich and Santorum officially declared and Huckabee bowed out. This leaves Palin as the only prominent Fox employee still dangling. But with no visible manifestation of a candidacy, can she be taken seriously? The fact of the matter is that if Palin was a candidate in earnest, Fox could not keep her on the payroll. At this late date they would have to insist that she either fish or cut bait, just as they did with Gingrich and Santorum. She could not be both undecided and a Fox News contributor.

Evidence of the Palin predicament occurred yesterday as two Fox News analysts admitted on the air that they temper their criticism of Palin because she is their colleague:

Greg Gutfeld: The only problem with talking about Sarah Palin is that she works here, and it’s like a coworker. And if I say something bad and I see her in the hallway I feel really awkward and wrong.

Bob Beckel: It has nothing to do with that. It has everything to do with your paycheck. That’s why you feel awkward about it. I know exactly what you mean. I’ll be honest, I’ve pulled my punches.

These admissions are not surprising and are not limited to Gutfeld and Beckel. It is the law at Fox News as it was laid down by the boss:

Roger Ailes: For the first time in our 14 years we’ve had people apparently shooting in the tent, from within the tent…We prefer people in the tent not dumping on other people in the tent.

So how does a Fox News reporter cover Palin when he has been warned by his boss not to criticize fellow tent-dwellers? That’s the problem, and that’s why Sarah Palin is not a candidate for president. Fox knows that they can’t cover even a potential candidate who receives a Fox paycheck this late in the game. If Palin has not informed the network that she isn’t running, they would have to sideline her. Since that has not happened, it’s a safe bet that she has already told them that she’s out of the race.

If that’s the case, then Fox News knows that a prospective candidate has opted out, but they are keeping it secret. That is not acceptable behavior from a legitimate news enterprise, which of course, Fox is not. They are withholding a significant news item that journalistic ethics would require they disclose. Particularly because the only reason for them to withhold it is for their own financial benefit, and for that of Palin.

What’s worse is that they are brazenly manipulating the course of the election in a manner that has implications for the other candidates and, of course, the voters. It is long past time for Fox to come clean and reveal what they know about Palin’s alleged candidacy. And in the unlikely event that she really is undecided, then Fox should suspend her just as they did Gingrich and Santorum.

Fox Nation vs. Reality: On Palin Bus Tour

Posted by on August 3, 2011 at 12:44 pm. 10 Comments :

This is a prime example of why political parody has become so difficult. The subjects of satire are too good at making themselves look stupid without any help. What does that leave for those of us who satirize them? Check out Fox Nation’s article on a planned mid-August bus tour by President Obama:

Obama Bus Tour

Really? Please note the “Obama 08” poster on Fox Nation’s photo proving that Obama obviously used buses before Sarah Palin did. Seriously, it’s their own photo. Yet Fox implies that Palin invented the political bus tour? Are they daft? (Don’t answer that). Palin didn’t even come up with an original name for her road trip. She copied the name, “One Nation,” from the progressive and union movement that held a rally in Washington, D.C., last October.

I think that the Fox Nationalists are actually pretty close to the truth this time. They just left out a small detail. Palin didn’t invent the political bus tour, she invented the “aborted” political bus tour. As we know, the cross-country trip that Palin planned (and is still promoting on her SarahPac web site) lasted all of six days and never made it past New Hampshire. Then she blatantly lied when asked about why the tour came to a screeching halt:

Palin: “Imagine our surprise when reading media reports today that the ‘One Nation Tour’ has been cancelled…The coming weeks are tight because civic duty calls (like most everyone else, even former governors get called up for jury duty) and I look forward to doing my part just like every other Alaskan.”

The only problem is that, unlike every other Alaskan, she never showed up for jury duty. In fact, she wasn’t even in Alaska. A few days after making her jury excuse for quitting the bus tour, she turned up at the debut of her crockumentary, “The Undefeated,” in Pella, Iowa. Incidentally, the film was a rip-roaring failure at the boxoffice and is already heading to video and the discount bins at WalMart.

Sarah Palin is a pitiful joke. The only thing she’s running for is the bank to deposit the cash she cons out of glassy-eyed fans who somehow find something coherent in her word jumbles. And the only way Obama could be charged with copying Palin on this is if he rolls into a handful of towns and then jets back to Camp David for some R&R.

Sarah Palin Utterly And Pitifully DEFEATED!

Posted by on July 31, 2011 at 3:53 pm. 2 Comments :

Sarah Palin - UndefeatedThe third week of release for Sarah Palin’s crockumentary, “The Undefeated,” saw its worst boxoffice performance yet. Dropping from 14 theaters last week to four this week, the film took in only $5,200 this weekend – a decline of 79%. Since its release, the million dollar production has earned a paltry $112,000 total.

Forget the press release extolling the success that sent the film to video after only two weeks in release. Never mind the ecstatic bragging by producers that the film was enjoying “overwhelming demand.” The UnDefeated flopped in a formidable fashion, despite the massive free publicity that Fox News gave the movie prior to, and during, its theatrical run. Here is a selection of the headlines from Fox that now seem pathetically quaint:

  • Hannity Exclusive: Sneak Peek of New Palin Documentary ‘The Undefeated’ (5/26/11)
  • Interview: Steve Bannon, the Man Who Brought Sarah Palin’s Story to the Screen (5/28/11)
  • A Sneak Peek of the New Palin Documentary (6/6/11)
  • New Palin Film, ‘The Undefeated,’ Getting Rave Reviews (6/6/11)
  • Preview of New Documentary on Sarah Palin: ‘The Undefeated’ (6/11/11)
  • RightOnline See Overwhelming Demand From Grassroots for Sneak Peek of Sarah Palin Movie Undefeated (6/15/11)
  • Palin Film Debuting in Iowa Next Week (6/24/11)
  • Palin Going to Iowa for “Undefeated” Premier (6/25/11)
  • Palin Film Selling Out in Theaters (7/15/11)
  • Palin Film Opens Strong, Theaters Packed (7/17/11)
  • Palin Film to Get Wider Release (7/19/11)
  • Click Here: Theaters Playing Palin’s ‘Undefeated’ (7/22/11)
  • Palin’s ‘Undefeated’ Scores Success in Liberal Chicago (7/26/11)

So the losing 2008 GOP vice-presidential candidate, who quit halfway through her single term as governor, and is currently garnering single digits near the bottom of most polls for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, has now officially been defeated at the boxoffice. Apparently her loyal fans cannot be bothered to do more than reTweet her lame musings and skim through her incoherent Facebook posts. All the more reason I really hope for this:

Palin/Cain

Fox Nation vs. Reality: On Al Sharpton

Posted by on July 25, 2011 at 11:45 am. 1 Comments :

Fox Nation - Al SharptonIn the latest episode of Fox Nation’s departure from reality, the Fox Nationalists have jumped on remarks by Al Sharpton that suggest he intends to refrain from ever criticizing President Obama. The headline: NBC News Hires Anchor Who Pledged to Not Criticize Obama About Anything.

First of all, That is not exactly what Sharpton said. The reference is to a 60 Minutes interview (via Cenk Uygur) where Sharpton said that criticizing Obama with regard to a black agenda would diminish his role as President. What he said was…

“What I don’t want to see is because he is black we act like he’s not the real president – he ought to be leading the black cause or the labor cause. He’s the President. To minimize who he is, I think, is an insult to the achievement of having him there.”

So this was not about never criticizing Obama, just not obsessing over a single issue. For the record, I’m no fan of Sharpton, but I do think that accuracy and honesty are important. And in that regard Fox should acknowledge that their whole business model rests on not criticizing Republicans and conservatives. In a specific example you have Dick Morris, who has been on the Fox payroll for years, and recently pledged never to criticize GOP front-runner Mitt Romney:

“I decided a couple of – a month or two ago to stop dumping on Mitt Romney, for example … Not because I approve of Romneycare, not because I approve of his flip-flops, flip on abortion, but because I may have to be one of those who carries this guy for a couple of months when he’s running against Obama and I don’t want to make my own task harder.”

It’s safe to say that he has the same policy toward any other prospective Obama opponent. And the same goes for his Fox colleagues. Remember that when you hear any of them talking about any of the GOP candidates.

Fox Nation - Obama PathologicalAnd just for fun, take a look at the featured story on Fox Nation this morning: Opinion: Is Obama a Pathological Liar?

Hmmm. That’s something to ponder. Along with: Is John Boehner a Child Molester? Is Michele Bachmann in League with Al Qaeda? Is Rupert Murdoch a Reptilian Alien? Does the Republican Party and Fox News shill for billionaires and anti-American multinational corporations to advance their own personal interests and greed? (Oh, wait a minute. That last one has already been verified).

Whose Side Are You On, Reagan Or Labor?

Posted by on July 21, 2011 at 10:23 am. 4 Comments :

FYI: The headline of this article is a trick question.

In the long-running debate over government spending, Republicans have repeatedly brought up unrelated issues connected to worker’s rights and collective bargaining. GOP governors across the nation are attempting to use the economic crisis to break unions and rollback the gains that working Americans have achieved over decades of organizing with massive popular support.

However, these regressive politicians who are doing the bidding of their wealthy, corporate benefactors, have a stark disagreement with one of their professed heroes:

Let me repeat that:

“Where free unions and collective bargaining are forbidden, freedom is lost.”

That’s right. None other than the sainted Ronald Reagan recognized how valuable unions are to America. This comment is more than a passive bit of pandering to working class constituents. It is an unambiguous affirmation that unions are not just a tangential group of negotiators for farmers or factory workers, but a vital institution that is a necessary component of freedom.

This should not come as too much of a surprise when considering that Reagan was the first, and only, union president (Screen Actors Guild) who ever ascended to the presidency of the United States.

Nevertheless, GOP governors have been bad-mouthing unions and their members for months (years, really). They refer to them as thugs and conjure up Mafioso imagery. They have embarked on a coordinated campaign to smear and discredit the very organizations that are standing up for our nations citizens and families, most of whom are working people, not wealthy hedge fund managers. It’s dishonest and dangerous and intended to harm average Americans.

Speaking of dangerous, the GOP governors who are mounting these attacks are represented by the Republican Governor’s Association (RGA). That’s the organization that Rupert Murdoch gave a million dollars to last year. Well, I would stay away from their web site. Norton Internet Security, a leading Internet software company that monitors web safety, reports that the RGA.org is “Unsafe” with six live computer threats.

Republican Governor's Association

The irony is delicious. The Republican governors web site is unsafe, a threat even, just as are the policies of their members.

[Update} This morning the RGA’s site status by Norton changed to “Untested.” That’s still not particularly comforting. However, it is also not nearly as accurate. The GOP’s policies have been tested and they do not work. We’ve had Bush’s tax cuts for the rich (I mean “job creators”) in place for ten years. Where are the jobs?

Chris Wallace Begs Michele Bachmann’s Forgiveness

Posted by on June 28, 2011 at 10:31 am. 4 Comments :

On last Sunday’s broadcast of Fox News Sunday, Anchor Chris Wallace listed a few of examples of why many people, including Republicans, consider Michele Bachmann to be a “flake.” Bachmann expressed her dismay at being insulted by Wallace, then left the studio to tell a Fox News reporter that she has the same spirit as serial murderer John Wayne Gacy.

After receiving harsh feedback from Bachmann’s supporters and Fox News disciples, Wallace immediately posted a video apology on the Fox News web site. However, that wasn’t enough because Wallace also had to call Bachmann that evening and personally kneel to kiss her ring.

All of this genuflection on the part of the Fox News anchor toward a favorite character on the network’s political soap opera is rather curious. One has to wonder why Wallace never apologized for calling President Obama and his administration “the biggest bunch of crybabies” he’d ever dealt with. Wallace also never apologized for calling Democrats “damn fools” for not gracing his program with their presence. These were insults that were aimed directly at his adversaries and represented his personal opinion, unlike the Bachmann episode where he was relaying the opinions of others. Yet he never felt compelled to apologize.

Does this represent Wallace’s fairness and balance? Or is it more representative of the point Jon Stewart made after getting Wallace to admit that Fox News “tells the other side of the story.” Wallace has since tried to back away from that comment by claiming he meant to say the “full” story. However, this isn’t the first time Wallace has used that framing to explain the Fox News bias. In July of 2008, Wallace told an interviewer that…

“…whether you like Fox News or don’t like it, it seems to me that it is a healthy development if only because it creates another view point.”

Yep. Fox News has been creating another point of view for years. Creating it from scratch at the behest of the conservative Republican hierarchy. That’s why no affront to liberals or Democrats is deserving of an apology, but when it comes to folks like Bachmann the amends must be made within minutes and repeatedly.

Truth-O-Meter Fail: Mitt Romney’s Job Recovery Disinformation

Posted by on June 16, 2011 at 11:19 pm. 5 Comments :

Republican presidential front-runner, Mitt Romney, was campaigning in a Tampa coffee shop where he delivered some remarks about the economy:

“It’s been a failure in the last several years to get America back on track again. It’s taken longer to get Americans back to work than it took during the Great Depression. This is the slowest job recovery since Hoover.”


Nice try, Mitt. An analysis by PolitiFact shows that Romney fell somewhat wide of the mark. As it turns out there were at least two, and perhaps as many as four, recessions that experienced slower recoveries. Amongst these were recessions overseen (and caused) by George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan. Now Romney and the rest of the GOP pack would like to go back to the policies that produced recoveries that were even slower than the one we are suffering through now.

I’m pretty sure that’s not what America wants, but whether or not they learn about the failures of the past that the GOP embraces will be determined by how thorough and honest the media is in reporting these facts.

PolitiFact goes into great detail in their analysis. They even explain the possible reasons that the present economic weakness has been so frustratingly enduring:

“Part of this likely stems from the severity of the recession (which most experts agree is the worst since the Great Depression) and part stems from a long-term trend toward relatively jobless recoveries. The first seven recoveries on our list averaged a jobs bounceback of more than 8 percent; the final five averaged 2 percent.”

By every standard of measure, the Obama administration is performing fairly well relative to historical comparisons, despite not achieving the results we all desire as rapidly as we would like. At least we are no longer in the vertical plunge the previous administration had cast us into.

The economy, as usual, will play a major role in the upcoming election. The challenge for Democrats is to tell the story of this recovery’s progress, even though to many voters it may not feel like there has been much. And the first line of attack is to call out the falsehoods and misrepresentations like the one Romney tried to pass off in Tampa.